Damsels in Distress (***1/2)

Watch this for five minutes and you’ll probably know if you’ll like its alternate-reality take on college life, as seen by a quartet of female roommates at the fictional Seven Oaks. Greta Gerwig, Ben Stiller’s mumbling love interest in Greenberg, plays the much perkier, talkier Violet, leader of the quartet, who in the space of the film’s first five minutes nearly faints from “acrid” B.O., discusses “the problem with contemporary social life,” laments that an “atmosphere of male barbarism prevails” at her institution, extols the virtues of dating “sad sacks” and plain-looking and/or unintellient men, and thwarts a potential suicide. Violet and her stylized dialogue are the creation of director Whit Stillman, who with just four films (in 22 years) is easily one of the more stylistically distinctive filmmakers around. All of his films feature what might be called the intellectually aspirational class, twentysomethings who might in ten years be Woody Allen characters, but here it’s in a playful way.

As the title may suggest, the movie has the flavor of a period piece, but one in which a 1990s song* is a “golden oldie” and anal sex is (obliquely) referred to. Violet dreams of initiating a “dance craze,” and a Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers-inspired musical number caps the film. At the same time, it doesn’t really seem like any actual old movies, although it slightly made me think of the recent French musical 8 Women. Of Violet’s friends, the one played by Megalyn Echikunwoke made me laugh the most by repeatedly issuing Anglo-Nigerian accented-warnings about “playboy-operator type” guys. Much of what amused me about the movie is hard to convey, but comes down to its unique brand of whimsy. For example, at Seven Oaks, there are no Greek-letter frats, only Roman letter ones, where the inhabitants are so dumb that they try to commit suicide by jumping from a second-story window.

The plot has something to do with Violet and her friends’ crusade to purge the campus of its coarser aspects, and some romantic mismatches, but, really, you won’t care about how any of that resolves itself. I’m not sure if Stillman intends to say anything about college, romantic attraction, suicide, the value of intelligence, lying, or any of the other things these damsels discuss, but that in no way distressed me.

* “Another Night” by Real McCoy

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viewed 4/25/12 at Ritz 5 and reviewed 4/25/12 and 4/26/12

The Princess of Montpensier (***1/2)

It took just under 350 years to make a film out of this tale by Marie de La Fayette, perhaps the first French novelist. De La Fayette wrote of a time still earlier, beginning her story in the midst of the religious wars that began in the late 1500s. Two prominent battle scenes, with swords and only the occasional gun, typify the attention to historical detail employed by director Bertrand Tavernier (A Sunday in the Country, Daddy Nostalgia). Perhaps even more noteworthy in that regard is the depiction of the wedding-night rituals apparently employed by the nobility. These are even less romantic than would befit the marriage of the princess, who has been pried away from her beloved in an arrangement economically suitable to her father.

The earliest part of the drama is slightly confusing—it took me a bit of time to figure to ascertain the allegiance (in the war) of the (more or less) male lead (Lambert Wilson), who is neither the princess’s beloved nor her husband, but the count who mentored her husband in the art of war and has now, disgusted by battle, laid down his sword. The princess (Mélanie Thierry) is a comely young woman with a keen mind, and the attention she draws, and her own thwarted desire, propel the action of the latter half of the film. This is more straightforward, but elegantly plotted. (Notwithstanding the setting, the course of action could easily be transplanted into a modern drama, or even a farce, though it’s not told that way here.) Of necessity, the philosophical elements of the novella are only present in small amounts, but the narrative and location filming make this adaptation a case of much better late than never.

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viewed 4/28/11 at Ritz 5 and reviewed 4/29/11

Burlesque (**1/2)

There’s nothing especially wrong with the musical, which represents the film debut of singer Christina Aguilera and the first musical (and first film in seven years) for Cher. But there’s nothing especially good with it either. Aguilera plays Ali, a spunky waitress from Iowa who hightails it out of there to make it in the big city (Los Angeles). With no plan and little money, she insists her way into a job at a club run by motherly but spunky Tess (Cher). She’s befriended by the bartender (Cam Gigandet), who tells her they’re “practically neighbors,” since he’s from Kentucky. Now only in the mind of a Hollywood screenwriter, or someone who’s never left the coasts, are an Iowan and a Kentuckian neighbors. Apparently also Hollywood’s version of Iowa had no singing jobs, but somehow the inexperienced Ali can belt it out like…Christina Aguilera, if only they’d let her on stage. (The real Christina, of course, spent her teen years developing her voice with professionals.)

For my taste, Aguilera has for the most part been more impressive than listenable, but her vocal histrionics are just the thing for the movie’s show-stopping numbers. Much of what she’s doing here isn’t too different from the throwback numbers on her 2006 album Back to Basics. It’s all loud and brassy, but more traditional in the beginning and edging toward techno-pop in the second half. Cher’s two numbers are the only ones I think I’d remember if I heard again. The opening title track, in which she also dances, is a pretty good show tune. Her other song is a Diane Warren power ballad that sounds a lot like other Diane Warren power ballads (“Because You Loved Me,” “How Do I Live,” “Un-break My Heart”). Various pop tunes (everything from Madonna’s “Ray of Light” to Boston’s “More Than a Feeling”) round out the soundtrack, so there’s something for everyone, more or less.

In the non-musical scenes, Aguilera projects the sort of pleasant vacuousness of Jessica Alba, but then, she wasn’t chosen for her acting skills. Cher is still a good actress, even if half of her lines are some variation on, No, I won’t sell this club. Tess is broke, but somehow you know she won’t sell the club, and Ali will save it. The one surprise in the movie is how. Always reliable Stanley Tucci plays a variation of his Devil Wears Prada character, Tess’s faithful and skillful assistant and would-be husband, if only he were straight. Kristin Bell plays the nemesis whose dislike for Ali comes entirely from Ali having made a joke at her expense early in the film.

For a film set in the world of Burlesque, there’s less fancy choreography than you’d think, and less sex too. You can watch with your pre-teen with only occasional, mild embarrassment, and even then it will probably involve the scenes with Ali’s eventual boyfriend. So, all in all, this is a bland affair that serves up a lot of clichés, but it’s not without entertainment value (and eye candy for both sexes). This is no Chicago, and it’s even a notch below Nine, but it will please fans of Aguilera and maybe even fans of musicals. Skeptics of either should look elsewhere.

IMDb link

viewed 11/17/10 at Ritz East [PFS screening] and reviewed 11/18–12/6/10

Broken Embraces (***1/4)

Pedro Almodóvar continues to give melodrama a good name with this sometimes lighthearted effort that also pays tribute to his love of cinema. I could have sworn that Harry Caine (Lluís Homar, of Almodóvar’s Bad Education), the name of the blind main character, was taken from an old Hitchcock movie. It’s not, but is a pseudonym explained, along with the blindness, in flashback scenes that form the bulk of the movie. Penelopé Cruz (in her fourth film for Almodóvar) appears as the mistress of a powerful older man who’s financing a film with her in the lead and with Caine (aka Mateo Blanco) as director. Blanca Portillo, who appeared with Cruz in Almodóvar’s most recent film, Volver, plays Harry/Mateo’s agent and confidant. Danger and duplicity fuel the unfolding mystery, about which saying more would detract.

Almodóvar’s recent films radiate a kind of joy even when the situation is melancholy. It’s as if by giving voice to his characters’ emotionality he is celebrating humanity. In this case there is also the joy in moviemaking. He has seemingly stopped making full-on comedies—the film-within-a-film here operating as a sort of tribute to the old Pedro—but humor makes its way into this story too, as well as jealousy, romance, regret, and redemption. Balancing the dark themes, it’s figuratively and literally colorful. Broken Embraces isn’t particularly deep, but Almodóvar has a vivid way with his characters and stories, whose only formula seems particular to their creator.

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viewed 1/23/10 at Ritz 5 and reviewed 2/7–3/1/10

Brothers (***1/4)

Who’d have figured, back in 2004 when Susanne Bier directed the original Danish version of this Afghanistan war drama, that years later a present-tense American version could be filmed? Both version deals with a soldier presumed lost in battle, here played by Tobey Maguire. Like most of the recent crop of American war films, the focus is on the trauma of war to the soldiers fighting it. In this case, it is also on how that plays out with those left at home—the distraught wife (Natalie Portman), the just-out-of-prison older brother (Jake Gyllenhaal) who’s also felt the disfavor of his father (Sam Shepard), the father himself, and the children who adapt quickly as their uncle takes up some of the father role. The audience knows, as the family does not, what has happened to the soldier. So a lot of the movie feels like mere prelude to what will happen in the last half hour or so. Still, the acting is very good, maybe Portman’s best role, and that last part is powerful, albeit showy. It’s a smart tearjerker, for sure, as well as a film about ethics and family dynamics.

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viewed 11/30/09 at Ritz East (PFS screening); review written unknown date and posted 4/16/10

Fantastic Mr. Fox (***3/4)

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viewed 1/2/10 at Ritz Bourse

2 Days in Paris (***)

Ah, Julie Delpy. She acts, in French and English. She directs. She writes. She even writes music. She’s done all of those things in this most unromantic of comedies that pairs her with Adam Goldberg. Don’t mind a lot of bickering and you’ll find this frequently funny and sometimes more.

Superficially, 2 Days is like Before Sunrise and Before Sunset, the brainy Richard Linklater romancers in which a charming Delpy starred with Ethan Hawke. But charm isn’t what the actress/auteur is aiming for. Goldberg, as the American boyfriend, is a crankier, hairier variation on Woody Allen’s persona. On her home turf, he marvels at number of ex-boyfriends they run into, and her surprisingly good relationships with them. Delpy’s own character could be called flighty.

The plot is beside the point. Dividing their time between visiting with her colorful but not dysfunctional family (Delpy’s real parents act these roles), attending parties, and hitting a tourist attraction or two, this semi-happy couple hash out their relationship issues, dis each other’s nationalities (and sometimes their own), and generally talk a lot (frequently about sex). Obviously, this won’t appeal to everyone. Occasionally, I questioned whether the characters would behave as they do; the supporting characters in particular seem unnaturally colorful. Between this and Rush Hour 3, one could get the idea that Parisians drove cabs just to have a captive audience for their rants. But what I did like was that Delpy, as writer-director, doesn’t take sides. It’s not clear who we are supposed to agree with, or which of her characters’ sometimes questionable attitudes are hers. (Except, I’d guess, their mutual contempt for George W. Bush.) Probably people will differ about which of these characters is more sympathetic, whether the couple should stay together, and whether French people are really like that.

I’ll still take Before Sunset over this, but it’s something different.

IMDB link

reviewed 8/23/07–8/30/07

Dreamgirls (***1/4)

 ? The Broadway musical based loosely on the story of the Supremes comes to the screen. Beyoncé Knowles takes on the Diana Ross role, the pretty girl singled out by a record company mogul (Jamie Foxx) to lead the “Dreams,” while the ostensible group leader (Jennifer Hudson), the plump Effie, gets pushed to the background despite her powerhouse voice. The overarching theme of the story is the desire for authenticity, which is contrasted with the pressure for commercial success. Foxx’s Curtis Taylor Jr., modeled after Motown founder Berry Gordy, represents the latter.

+ Like Chicago, this made me forget I didn’t like musicals. Hudson is already famous for this, her debut role, and her character is the one who goes through the most changes and whose vocals must carry the greatest emotional weight. Besides Hudson’s Effie, the most compelling character is Eddie Murphy’s, playing a singer whose career is revitalized when he signs with Taylor’s label. Murphy shows none of the mannerisms of his comedy roles and with his singing atones for his big bad hit single “Party All the Time.” The music includes both “period” songs incorporated into the story, the best of which I found to be the ersatz Motown ones from the first half of the film, and the burst-into-song numbers that sound like a soulful take on traditional Broadway show tunes. That all of the music (not the lyrics) was written by Henry Krieger is impressive given this stylistic range.

- Chicago screenwriter Bill Condon has the directing chores here too, and he’s certainly competent, but the film lacks the visual panache that Rob Marshall gave to that musical. Moreover, whereas Chicago was essentially finely polished fluff, Dreamgirls is a movie that’s meant to seem realistic despite being a musical. Given that, I thought that a couple of the characters, especially Effie, seemed to have personality shifts that seemed jarring. The performances and the music definitely fill in some of these gaps, but they’re still there, mostly in the 1960s scenes. And the music snob in me compels the minor complaint that most of the “early 1960s” songs sounded a few years ahead of their time. An admittedly funny scene goes the opposite way: a white group does a bland cover version to prevent the more soulful original from charting. Although this was done often in the 1950s, the practice had declined, and the performance in the movie would have already seemed dated by the time the scene takes place. I’m being picky, but a movie like Ray did just a little better job of portraying the music business.

= ***1/4 The movie contains some dramatic lapses that would be more noticeable in a non-musical, but the performances (musical and dramatic) are on the whole tremendously entertaining, even touching. At over two hours, the movie still goes by quick.

IMDb link

Deck the Halls (*1/2)

? A New England optometrist (Matthew Broderick) gets jealous when a new neighbor (Danny DeVito) seems to be usurping his position as his town’s unofficial Christmas guru.

+  DeVito’s a pretty good fit for the role of a perennial screw-up (and slick salesman) who finds a purpose in his quest to put up enough Christmas lights to make his house visible from space. The house is crass but impressive to look at.

- This is as screechingly awful as a sleigh on dry pavement. Even the music is obnoxious. It sort of reminded me of the Steve Martin Cheaper by the Dozen sequel, except the kids and spouses are relegated to more minor roles while dad behaves idiotically and gets dumped on (almost literally). Near the beginning, Broderick’s son frets that he’s ten yet hasn’t accomplished anything. This is the sort of phony behavior you usually only see in terrible sitcoms, but the boy’s pre-midlife crisis is resolved without explanation anyway. A running gag where DeVito’s daughters are supposed to be slutty bimbos is similarly artificial, more crass than funny. But the focus is mostly on the dads, especially Broderick, who’s insufferable. When the inevitable attempt to tug at the heartstrings occurs, you’ll barely care. If the movie had just ended at that point, at least it would have conveyed a positive message. But the ending reinforces that it Christmas really is about garish displays. And please, someone get Kristin Davis, who plays Broderick’s suffering spouse, a decent role, or at least a decent on-screen husband. The ex-Sex on the City actress’s other gig in 2006 was as Tim Allen’s wife in The Shaggy Dog. Woof.

= *1/2 I didn’t think there’d be a worse holiday-themed movie in 2006 than the Santa Clause 3, but I may have been wrong. If the kids beg you to see a movie about a middle-aged guy being a jackass for 90 minutes, this is the Christmas turkey to choose.

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My Super Ex-Girlfriend (**1/2)

This middling comedy fluff about a guy who dumps his superhero girlfriend and finds her becoming a stalker is more pleasant than comic.

Wouldn’t it be awful to break up with a needy, jealous superhero? That’s pretty much the concept of this comedy from the pen of Simpsons writer Don Payne. The superhero is Uma Thurman. Think of a female version of Superman (“G Girl” here) whose Clark Kentish alter-ego is no put-on. Luke Wilson woos her, wins her, and regrets it in the first half, then tries to avoid her in the second. Anna Faris is also on hand as an object of jealousy. This is generic fluff competently directed by Ivan Reitman (Ghost Busters, Kindergarten Cop). It doesn’t get too dumb, yet there are few genuine laughs. Unless you think watching Thurman boff Wilson so hard that — get this — the bed breaks is hilarious, save this for cable.

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The Squid and the Whale (****)

This is a brilliant little slice-of-time movie, set in 1986 Brooklyn, about a family dealing with divorce. (It’s autobiographical on the part of writer-director Noah Baumbach.) It’s a melancholy and emotional, but not maudlin, film, aided by a nice quiet soundtrack. The parents are Jeff Daniels and Laura Linney. Linney’s very good, but Daniels’s is the pivotal character, a self-important literature professor and unsuccessful novelist who fortifies his ego by being fiercely competitive. The couple’s college-age son reacts by adopting his father’s opinions as his own, while the younger one recoils.

This isn’t a comedy, but it’s almost funny how much the professor’s image of himself is divorced from reality. Daniels is quite brilliant in his portrayal of the almost hilariously narcissistic father, and Jesse Eisenberg and Owen Kline make strong impressions as the sons, too. Even without having to read it, it’s almost impossible not to assume that the father is based on a real person, such is the level of detail in the character. You’re embarrassed for the son as he parrots his fathers opinions, such as that This Side of Paradise is “lesser Fitzgerald,” though he inconveniently hasn’t read it.Baumbach doesn’t take his characters through too many changes, mostly just the older son becoming a little wiser. (There’s no needless flash forward to 2005, either.) He offers only distinctive personalities and efficient storytelling.

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circulated via email 11/10/05 and revised/posted 10/9/13